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I worked out that for me, even accounting for energy bills and such, working from home full time would be equivalent to a 15% pay rise. And on top of that, I'd

I worked out that for me, even accounting for energy bills and such, working from home full time would be equivalent to a 15% pay rise. And on top of that, I'd have 2 hours of extra free time every day. I can't understand the kind of person who wouldn't want that.

throw827474737 4y ago
Totally.. and if you really miss the socializing in the office because of being young and alone, or fresh in a city (only reason why I could understand that): find a nice coworking space nearby and you can have most of the things the author seems to miss?
- tsimionescu 4y ago
  Socializing with your colleagues has nothing to do with socializing with random people who happen to work in the same space. Work is part of many people's identity, they take pride in their work and enjoy discussing and improving it. It is also not part of many other people's identities. Both are perfectly valid approaches to life.
distances 4y ago
Is that just from commuting? For me the cost is 50-100€ per month depending on the cost of the public transport ticket, and that I can deduct from taxes anyway. Plus a couple of extra lunches I would buy with WFO. So basically negligible.
- InitialLastName 4y ago
  Do you value your time at $0?
  - distances 4y ago
    The parent wrote "on top of that, [..] 2 hours of extra free time". So they didn't include time valuation to the 15%.
- sidlls 4y ago
  Here’s an example of train commuter fares in the Bay Area: https://www.caltrain.com/fares https://www.caltrain.com/fares. Travel from San Mateo to San Francisco (3 zones, around 20 miles) is $200/month. That’s the discounted fare for a ticket. It doesn’t cover parking or travel to/from the train. If you need transportation to/from the train it can add another $50-$100 per month for fares, or more for parking fees and gas consumption for drivers. And BART (a different rail system) is even more expensive. That’s not negligible: that’s almost three hours of work for me to cover the cost (pre-tax). And I’m fairly well paid. Most engineers aren’t paid half as well. It’s a much bigger hit for them.
- ghaff 4y ago
  I assume that's just a bus/subway pass? At least where I live, parking at the train station, a monthly train pass, plus a monthly transit pass would be something like $500 or $600 dollars. To say nothing of taking almost 90 minutes door to door.
  - distances 4y ago
    Yes that's the scale for monthly public transport ticket price in large number of continental European cities. I don't own a car so I may be out of touch with those expenses, 15% just sounded to me like a lot. The time value is of course then on top, but the parent accounted for that separately.
    - ghaff 4y ago
      A monthly bus/subway pass in the local large city is in that range as well--about $90. But, as in the Bay Area example, that starts going up quite a bit if you take rail that goes beyond the bus/subway system. In Boston, if you don't have a car you almost certainly wouldn't be taking commuter rail with fairly few exceptions.
wccrawford 4y ago
There are always tradeoffs. You could make a lot more money, but in return you'd have added risk and probably have to do things that you think are "evil". If I said, "I can't understand the kind of person who doesn't want to make more money" that completely ignores the tradeoffs. Likewise, work-from-office people get something out of that experience that is more valuable to them than 2 more hours per day of free time. It varies from person to person.

throw827474737 4y ago

Totally.. and if you really miss the socializing in the office because of being young and alone, or fresh in a city (only reason why I could understand that): find a nice coworking space nearby and you can have most of the things the author seems to miss?

tsimionescu 4y ago
Socializing with your colleagues has nothing to do with socializing with random people who happen to work in the same space. Work is part of many people's identity, they take pride in their work and enjoy discussing and improving it. It is also not part of many other people's identities. Both are perfectly valid approaches to life.

distances 4y ago

Is that just from commuting? For me the cost is 50-100€ per month depending on the cost of the public transport ticket, and that I can deduct from taxes anyway. Plus a couple of extra lunches I would buy with WFO. So basically negligible.

InitialLastName 4y ago
Do you value your time at $0?
- distances 4y ago
  The parent wrote "on top of that, [..] 2 hours of extra free time". So they didn't include time valuation to the 15%.
sidlls 4y ago
Here’s an example of train commuter fares in the Bay Area: https://www.caltrain.com/fares https://www.caltrain.com/fares. Travel from San Mateo to San Francisco (3 zones, around 20 miles) is $200/month. That’s the discounted fare for a ticket. It doesn’t cover parking or travel to/from the train. If you need transportation to/from the train it can add another $50-$100 per month for fares, or more for parking fees and gas consumption for drivers. And BART (a different rail system) is even more expensive. That’s not negligible: that’s almost three hours of work for me to cover the cost (pre-tax). And I’m fairly well paid. Most engineers aren’t paid half as well. It’s a much bigger hit for them.
ghaff 4y ago
I assume that's just a bus/subway pass? At least where I live, parking at the train station, a monthly train pass, plus a monthly transit pass would be something like $500 or $600 dollars. To say nothing of taking almost 90 minutes door to door.
- distances 4y ago
  Yes that's the scale for monthly public transport ticket price in large number of continental European cities. I don't own a car so I may be out of touch with those expenses, 15% just sounded to me like a lot. The time value is of course then on top, but the parent accounted for that separately.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    A monthly bus/subway pass in the local large city is in that range as well--about $90. But, as in the Bay Area example, that starts going up quite a bit if you take rail that goes beyond the bus/subway system. In Boston, if you don't have a car you almost certainly wouldn't be taking commuter rail with fairly few exceptions.

wccrawford 4y ago

There are always tradeoffs. You could make a lot more money, but in return you'd have added risk and probably have to do things that you think are "evil". If I said, "I can't understand the kind of person who doesn't want to make more money" that completely ignores the tradeoffs. Likewise, work-from-office people get something out of that experience that is more valuable to them than 2 more hours per day of free time. It varies from person to person.